How To Add Military Experience To A Resume (With Examples)

After getting out of the military, it can be difficult to get a job because there is often a gap in your resume for the time you serve. You may be wondering how it’s possible to get a job with only your military experience under your belt. Believe it or not, you can put your military experience on your resume to help you get a job after you get back from your service.

If you just got out of the military, we’ll go over how to put military experience on a resume, provide an example resume with military experience, as well as how to use the military experience as an advantage to help you get your next job.

Key Takeaways:

• Military experience on resume can be added to the sections:

  • Summary statement

  • Work experience

  • Awards or achievements

  • Skills and certifications

• Have a non-military friend look over your resume because they can identify confusing aspects that someone with a military background might take for granted.

• Avoid using military-specific jargon when discussing military status in cv because it can confuse anyone who is not in the military.

How to add military experience to a resume

When adding military experience to your resume, you should include it in your resume summary statement or include it in your work experience section. Here are more ways to how to list military service on resume:

1. Include it in your resume summary statement. If your military experience is fairly recent, it’s a good idea to include it in your resume summary statement. Recruiters and hiring managers often read this part first to gain a quick understanding of who you are and what you’re all about.

   In about four sentences, talk about your military background in the context of the job you’re applying for. Focus on the key skills and qualities that your military experience instilled in you and how those prepared you for a career in your chosen civilian field.

2. Include it in your work experience section. You had a job in the military and, just like any other job, it should be included in your professional history. Name your position, the dates you were in that position, and add a few bullet points of your most impressive responsibilities and accomplishments.

   Read the job description carefully and mirror the keywords you find there. Whenever you can apply a keyword to your military experience naturally, do so.

   Clearly separate your former civilian and military roles. For both categories, though, quantify achievements when you can; numbers help recruiters and hiring managers understand the tangible impact you made.

3. Include it in your achievements or awards section. If you received any military honors during your service, definitely include those on your resume.

   While you can put them in your work experience in a bullet point, you can make them stand out more in their own accomplishments section. Medals, awards, or any other honors you received are fair game.

4. Include it in your skills and certifications sections. The military likely certified you to perform certain tasks, and those certifications might carry a lot of weight depending on your industry.

   Language skills, certifications for machinery or processes, and other technical skills that transfer to the job you’re applying for can all be impressive.

Example of resume with military experience

What do employers like to see in applicants with military experience?

More than anything, someone with military experience understands how a chain of command works and knows how to follow through with pretty much any set of marching orders they’re given. Military experience can bring desirable qualities that employers are looking for such as:

• Discretion

• Strong work ethic

• Reliability

• The ability to work with a team

• Discipline

• Leadership

Even if serving in the military came with no additional experience or other benefits, this would still be massively valuable to employers.

And people who have spent years in the military don’t always know the best way to describe the things that they’re capable of doing in less military-specific terms.

Tips for adding military experience to your resume

When adding military experience to your resume you should avoid using any military-specific jargon and include keywords from the job description to match your skills and qualifications. Here are some more tips to keep in mind when adding military experience to your resume.

• Avoid acronyms and military-specific jargon. This might seem like a no-brainer, but it can be tough to remember which terms you’re familiar with because you’re a human who’s been alive as long as you have, and which ones you only know because of your service. Take care to exclude the latter ones where possible.

• Leave out irrelevant certifications. If you trained as an electrical engineer while you were in the service, that’s probably a good thing to bring up. Weapons training is probably not quite as relevant.

• List it the same way that you would any other work experience. Even if the truth is a bit more complicated, anyone reading your resume should be able to understand the short version of your experience at a glance. Stick to a few short bullet points, and make sure to list dates.

• Describe non-obvious items from your resume. Lastly, make sure that any training or certifications you have that aren’t totally self-explanatory gets at least a cursory description — and remember that you might have a different perspective of what is or isn’t self-explanatory.

• Proofread. It’s important to take the extra couple of minutes and look at your resume again. This helps find any spelling errors or grammar mistakes that could come off as unprofessional. Have someone else take a look at your resume to see if they can catch something you might have missed.

• Use keywords. This is a great way to employers that you are a good fit for the position. Reread the job description and pick out any keywords that they have included that match your skills or qualifications.

• Get a second opinion. Now that you’ve included your military experience throughout your resume, have a civilian give your resume a look. They can identify confusing aspects that someone with a military background might take for granted.

Military skills to include on your resume

When you’re in the military, you can learn valuable soft and hard skills that will help you when applying for jobs when you’re no longer serving. Here are some transferable skills that you may have gained in the military that are useful in civilian careers:

• Communication. When you’re in the military, communication is essential. You have to communicate with your team members and supervisors to complete objectives and missions. Those skills will be useful in almost any civilian job. Communication is essential for any successful team and employers are looking for this skill on your resume.

• Flexibility. Oftentimes when you’re in the military, you learn how to be flexible and adapt to new changes. You may have to adapt to a new location, team, or new job. This skill will help you in many civilian jobs to help you stay productive and successful. Flexibility will also help you work with coworkers who may have different opinions or work styles.

• Problem-solving. Problem-solving is a skill that you can learn pretty quickly in the military because there may be times when you have limited resources and you have to find a way to complete the job with the limited resources. This skill is useful in civilian jobs and is a skill most employers are looking for.

• Teamwork. Teamwork is an essential skill whether you’re working with your team in the military or your team in an office. Having teamwork skills allows you to achieve goals and meet deadlines and is a useful skill most employers are looking for.

• Leadership. There are different levels of the hierarchy structure in the military and the military teaches excellent leadership and management skills no matter what level you are. Leadership skills allow you to branch out into management or supervisor positions and is a skill employers are looking for on resumes.

How to use military experience to your advantage during your interview

When you are in an interview, you should keep the conversation on the topic if an employer asks too many questions regarding your military experience. Here are some other ways to use your military experience during the interview:

• Keep the conversation on the topic. An employer might spend far too much time grilling you on your military experience, which can sometimes paint you in a light you’re not comfortable with. On the other hand, some civilian employers might be hesitant to bring up your military background out of nervousness.

  In either case, a balance is necessary — make sure it gets brought up, but don’t let it take things over.

• Keep things relevant. If you have a decade or more of military experience, remember that the rules are the same as with civilian job experience — talk about the most relevant thing first. It’s not super useful to talk about your early training if you’ve been in the Armed Forces for a dozen or so years.

• Decline inappropriate questions. If the questions someone is asking regarding your service are inappropriate or too personal, don’t be afraid to shut them down. Your military experience is your own, and not for them to dissect — bring up what’s relevant, and make sure they respect your privacy about the rest.

Military experience on resume FAQ

1. What is considered military experience?

   Military experience consists of any relevant job experience obtained while enlisted in a branch of the military. Your military experience could consist of your year in the military or if you served 20 years.

2. Is military service good on a resume?

   Yes, your military service is good for your resume. Your military experience is good for your resume because there are many skills that you learn in the military that are useful for many civilian jobs. However, if the experience is not relevant to the job you are applying for, you can leave it off your resume.

3. Should I disclose my military service on my resume?

   Yes, you should disclose your military service on your resume if you plan on using the experience for career progression. While you can leave the military affiliation section blank on your job application, not disclosing any affiliation could potentially result in legal employment termination if the military affiliation conflicts with employment requirements.

Final thoughts

That’s all for this one! Just keep in mind: When talking about your experience, framing it as a story is the most important thing.

Regardless of whether you really “learned anything” in a big cosmic sense from your military experience, people are going to expect you to be able to codify the experience into some kind of employment-related fable.

That means becoming comfortable saying things like “Doing [this particular thing I did] in the military really taught me about [responsibility or respect or something like that].”

It’s possible you really feel that you have some sort of major, easily digestible takeaway from your experience — in which case, congratulations!

But life is messy, and often what an experience means to you can be tough to parse out.

So whatever you do, make sure you think about what your own service means to you beforehand, because — fair or not — people are going to expect you to have an answer on that count.

References

1. Military One Source – How to Write a Civilian Resume

Author

Ryan Morris

Ryan Morris was a writer for the Zippia Advice blog who tried to make the job process a little more entertaining for all those involved. He obtained his BA and Masters from Appalachian State University.

Expert

Don Pippin, MHRM, CPRW, CDCS

Don Pippin is an executive and HR leader for Fortune 50 and 500 companies and startups. In 2008, Don launched area|Talent with a focus on helping clients identify their brand. As a Certified Professional Resume Writer, Certified Digital Career Strategist, and Certified Personal Branding Strategist, Don guides clients through career transitions.